February 11, 2013

by jkatejohnston

Dear Max,

I have these recordings of Marvin Mudrick’s Troilus and Criseyde class. They’re fun to listen to–really, really good–and I wanted to transcribe them. There are five classes, about two and a half hours each. So I ordered some transcription software which was going to make it all easy. The software package says, “Brains & Beauty: A Fantastic Combination. MacSpeech Scribe is one smart cookie. It boasts an astounding accuracy rate of up to 99%.”

So I installed the software and calibrated and trained it to Mudrick’s voice, and here is a transcript of about ninety seconds in the middle of class:

You reading your seat belt was pretty tricky since the others will some discussion they know we know she or she is currently provided by the University result is a world of not feeling well and she herself on an opera singer and a lot better him in the iPhone and iPhone and also in rule six of the earth is a significant.

Here is my transcript of the same:

Mudrick: If you read it carefully you will see how Pandarus arranges to get Criseyde in alone. It’s very tricky. He sends the others off to some kind of discussion. They don’t know, nobody knows, that Criseyde is alone. [Inaudible exchange between Mudrick and several students.]

Student: What happens right then?

Mudrick: He kisses her.

Student: Yeah, that surprised me.

Mudrick: Well, it’s clear that, it’s clear by this time that she’s pretty flattered by the fact that he’s so stuck on her. She makes that clear. You remember she’s thinking to herself, “People are saying Troilus is not feeling well, isn’t that too bad,” and she thinks to herself, “I know there’s one person here who could make him feel a lot better.”

It took me about twenty-five minutes to make that transcript. I played the passage about fifteen times. All this makes me realize all over again that Lance Kaplan’s Mudrick Transcribed really is a double miracle. A court reporter couldn’t make that book. You have to be permeated by the Mudrickian ether.

For the extremely few people reading this who may not know about that book, here is a link. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Mudrick+Transcribed